William Donelan, the second-highest ranking executive of the Duke University Health System, announced Thursday that he is retiring Sept. 30.
Donelan, executive vice president and chief operating officer of DUHS, vice chancellor for health affairs at Duke University and an alumnus of the Fuqua School of Business, has worked for the medical center for 36 years—his entire professional career.
“My experience here has been remarkable,” Donelan said. “We are celebrating [Duke Medicine’s] 75th anniversary this year, and I have been there for roughly half of it.”
Donelan was appointed to his current role in 1999 by former Chancellor Ralph Snyderman and has senior responsibility for overseeing DUHS’s financial and administrative affairs.
Dr. Robert Califf, vice chancellor for clinical research at Duke University Medical Center, has had a working relationship with Donelan since 1973. He lauded Donelan for having “home-spun wisdom” as a mentor and said he is very philosophical in his thinking.
“He has been a counselor to a lot of people. People go to him for advice on how to deal with difficult situations,” Califf said. “He will be missed.”
Donelan was a driving force behind the creation of the Duke Clinical Research Institute, a world-renowned academic organization. He also helped the medical center transition into a health system in 1998.
“He was the orchestrator,” Califf said of Donelan’s role in the creation of DUHS. “If you think about the operational part. Snyderman was the person who had the vision.... Donelan was the guy behind the scenes making it happen.”
After Snyderman retired in 2004, Dr. Victor Dzau was appointed as chancellor for health affairs and president and CEO for DUHS. Though Dzau and Donelan have only worked closely with one another for a little more than a year, Donelan said he had a close relationship with Dzau.
Donelan, 58, noted that he has been thinking of retiring for the last few years but did not due to the change in leadership when both Snyderman and former President Nan Keohane retired in the same year. Since then, Donelan has worked with Dzau to reorganize DUHS’s administrative structure so that Donelan would be able to retire without disrupting day-to-day operations.
The reorganization occurred last July. Dzau created three new senior executive positions, filling them with homegrown talent. Dr. Michael Cuffe was appointed vice president for medical affairs, Dr. William Fulkerson became Duke Hospital’s chief executive officer and vice president for acute care and Paul Newman was promoted to vice president for ambulatory care.
Donelan said that because of these promotions, Dzau may not need to fill his soon-to-be open position in the immediate future.
“[The reorganization] enables Victor to get the management arranged the way he wanted to... and it gave me the flexibility to do something like this,” Donelan said.
Dzau announced Donelan’s retirement to hospital leadership in a memo Thursday afternoon.
“He will leave with our thanks and best wishes for the future,” Dzau wrote. “While Bill’s departure will be felt, I am excited about our new management structure.”
Donelan noted that although he leaves with only warm feelings for Duke, he will enjoy his retirement.
“The first thing I’m going to do is take advantage of the opportunity... to sit back and think about what I want to do next,” Donelan said, noting he has received several job offers over the span of his career and that he might look more seriously at some.
“I can’t see me going into a classic retirement mode at this point.”
Donelan said even though he is retiring, he will miss Duke’s daily grind. “How can you not?” he said. “How can you not after doing something within the same institution for approaching four decades? I’m sure I will miss it.”
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